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We return to a couple of popular Newsweek themes this week. Who said journalism has to be ground-breaking? We don't just dip a toe into an issue, shake it and move on, you know. We like to build up the journalism in layers so that if you listen regularly you can observe how issues evolve - and hopefully your knowledge and understanding evolve too. The last time we spoke to Professor Andrew Hughes-Hallet of , he caused a flutter in the doocots by categorically rubbishing the idea that Scotland was "subsidised by England", giving chapter and verse on how the truth was the other way round...not a view you hear often outside nationalist circles (that sounds like those celtic designs you get on standing stones, doesn't it?)

We speak to him again this time about the statement by Michael Moore at Scottish Questions in reply to a Tory backbencher in which the Scottish Secretary stated Scotland could not have afforded the £27 billion bail-out of and , implying an independent country would have been bankrupted. That was almost an identical answer to that given to another Tory backbencher by Jim Murphy in the last Labour government. The professor, who is on a break in Western Australia, is, shall we say, not impressed by those arguments and explains exactly what would have happened to the bail-out had Scotland been independent. He is, as always, controversial.

As is Harry Shutt who is a kind of guerrilla economist. After our ding-dong last week on pension reform in which it was made clear that directors have no plans to cut back their pensions - au contraire, they boosted their pension pots by £400,000 on average last year - we speak to Harry on his solution to the crisis in pensions for the low-paid. He says the markets have simply failed to deliver a return to small pension investors and the pension managers have ripped them off with exorbitant fees. So we should abandon stock market gambling and concentrate on boosting the state pension and add to it an occupational top-up. (He explains it much better than I do) It's well worth thinking about.

Other items we are chasing - for we never rest - include preservation of ancient buildings with atmospheric in mind, and what should we do with all this rain? Are you, like us, tempted to think of selling it to England where the south is in a drought? If we have to put up with wetter weather, shouldn't we turn entrepreneur and make a few quid from our liquid assets?

Oh, and naturally we ruminate on the Inverclyde by election with Angus Macleod who will review the papers for us as usual. Join us tomorrow. At 8.